during the day; some weekly; and some at
irregular, but certain frequent chances of their business. Mr. Astor,
when in town, rarely misses his daily ride; nor Mr. Bancroft; Mr. Mayor
Harper never his drive. And there are certain working-men with their
families equally sure to be met walking on Sunday morning or Sunday
afternoon; others on Saturday. The number of these _habitues_ constantly
increases. When we meet those who depend on the Park as on the butcher
and the omnibus, and the thousands who are again drawn by whatever
impulse and suggestion of the hour, we often ask, What would they have
done, where would they have been, to what sort of recreation would they
have turned, _if to any_, had there been no park? Of one sort the answer
is supplied by the keeper of a certain saloon, who came to the Park, as
he said, to see his old Sunday customers. The enjoyment of the ice had
made them forget their grog.

Six or seven years ago, an opposition brought down the prices and
quadrupled the accommodations of the Staten Island ferry-boats. Clifton
Park and numerous German gardens were opened; and the consequence was
described, in common phrase, as the transformation of a portion of the
island, on Sunday, to a Pandemonium. We thought we would, like Dante,
have a cool look at it. We had read so much about it, and heard it
talked about and preached about so much, that we were greatly surprised
to find the throng upon the sidewalks quite as orderly and a great deal
more evidently good-natured than any we ever saw before in the United
States. We spent some time in what we had been led to suppose the
hottest place, Clifton Park, in which there was a band of music and
several thousand persons, chiefly Germans, though with a good sprinkling
of Irish servant-girls with their lovers and brothers, with beer
and ices; but we saw no rudeness, and no more impropriety, no more
excitement, no more (week-day) sin, than we had seen at the church in
the morning. Every face, however, was foreign. By-and-by came in three
Americans, talking loudly, moving rudely, proclaiming contempt for
"lager" and yelling for "liquor," bantering and offering fight, joking
coarsely, profane, noisy, demonstrative in any and every way, to the end
of attracting attention to themselves, and proclaiming that they were
"on a spree" and highly excited. They could not keep it up; they became
awkward, ill at ease, and at length silent, standing looking about them
in stupi